LSTM’s Dr Emily Adams, Reader in Infectious Diseases, and Royal Society Entrepreneur in Residence, Dr Fiona Marston OBE, have been named as ‘Movers and Shakers’ in BioBusiness 2021.
The eighth report, which is released every year by BioBeat, features the successes and journeys of individuals within the area of biosciences. The report features the profiles of 30 talented individuals who are tackling the current biggest health challenges, creating new opportunities for growth by combining a human understanding of technology and data with the drive to make healthcare improvements more accessible.
Dr Emily Adams and her team designed methodologies to evaluate diagnostic tests for SARS-CoV-2,assessing more than 50 types of rapid COVID-19 tests to ensure they were fit for purpose, with the data contributing to the Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics and WHO regulatory approvals. Taking the fight against COVID-19 beyond the UK, Dr Adams and her team are starting trials in Brazil, Nigeria, and Indonesia.
Dr Fiona Marson is galvanizing academic engagement with industry, building responsive relationships between LSTM and its commercial partners, navigating external and internal negotiation challenges. In the past 18 months, Dr Marston has secured collaborations around vaccine development with associated revenues of £3 million including commercial engagement with Pfizer as part of the COVID-19 SAFER and FASTER clinical trials.
These extraordinary times have brought into sharp focus the vital role of innovation in addressing threats to health and wellbeing and creating new opportunities to deliver societal benefit. In addition, innovation thrives on collaboration across disciplines and borders – as reflected in the partnerships behind our most pivotal pandemic response programmes.
The work of Dr Marston and Dr Adams accelerates the pipeline from blue-skies research to innovation and intervention, which has been visible not only in response to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic but across all aspects of health and wellbeing.